Academic Freedom

Resources

Published: 
Monday, June 27, 2011
This month, the Richland School Board voted 3 to 2 to exclude Sherman Alexie’s award-winning book The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian from Richland high school classrooms. Alexie’s semiautobiographical novel won the National Book Award for young adults in 2007. It tells the story of Arnold “Junior” Spirit, a teenager growing up on the Spokane Indian Reservation in Washington, where Alexie also grew up. Junior struggles as an awkward but bright 14-year-old who loves drawing comics. The book tackles many tough issues, including racism, alcoholism, poverty, death, as well as more typical teenage struggles like fitting in. The book was piloted for Richland’s ninth-grade language arts curriculum because of its realistic portrayal of the high school experience and compelling theme of perseverance. The piloting teacher acknowledged that the book contains some profanity and sexual references.
Published: 
Friday, April 15, 2011
Many students may not be aware of the extent to which schools are censoring and blocking their access to these sites. The ACLU’s Don’t Filter Me campaign has set up a useful quiz to help you find out if your school is filtering your access to LGBT webpages.  
Published: 
Thursday, March 31, 2011
Women's History Month gives us an opportunity to reflect on the great strides women and girls have made toward achieving equal rights and equal treatment. Yet, in some ways we are still stuck in the past — as I was reminded of recently when I had the opportunity to step into classrooms in urban Seattle and hear the stories of pregnant and parenting students who are being pressured to drop out of school. As I stand in front of these young women and share information about their rights under Title IX, jaws drop and hands shoot up with questions.
Published: 
Tuesday, November 9, 2010
The ACLU-WA applauds the efforts of two eastern Washington school districts that have taken important strides toward implementing comprehensive sex education. We’ve been working together with the Central Valley and Clarkston school districts to align their sex education curricula with the requirements of Washington’s Healthy Youth Act. Both districts have confirmed they are removing from their curricula materials that, among other things, provide medically inaccurate information, promote gender stereotypes, and show a bias against LGBT students. Removing such materials will help ensure that students acquire knowledge needed to protect their health and build healthy relationships. The ACLU-WA urges other school districts to review their curricula to make sure they follow the Healthy Youth Act’s requirements for being medically and scientifically accurate and free of bias.
Published: 
Thursday, October 28, 2010
Schools must protect students from harassment, and if they don’t, the federal government will have something to say about it.  That was the message sent by the White House and the Department of Education on October 26th when they issued new guidance designed to make clear that schools have a legal duty to protect students from harassment under existing federal civil rights statutes. Read more
News Release, Published: 
Monday, January 11, 2010
The ACLU of Washington urges President Stephen M. Jordan to reconsider the decision to cancel the scheduled April 5 campus appearance of guest speaker Ward Churchill due to concerns over security. Canceling the appearance makes Eastern Washington University complicit in a "heckler's veto," where any group of protesters that is big enough or violent enough can silence their outnumbered opponents.
News Release, Published: 
Friday, November 20, 2009
For the second straight year, the first week of school brought the ACLU a plea for help from a student in trouble for refusing to stand for the flag salute.
News Release, Published: 
Monday, November 2, 2009
Jessica Beckett, a senior at North Kitsap High School in Poulsbo, has been selected to receive a Youth Activist Scholarship Award in recognition of her work for civil liberties. The $4,000 college scholarship is one of nine awarded by the American Civil Liberties Union to high school students around the nation.
News Release, Published: 
Monday, November 2, 2009
The ACLU's Kitsap County Chapter fought an effort to censor David Guterson's Snow Falling on Cedars, a murder mystery about prejudice toward Japanese Americans after World War II. After South Kitsap County School District teacher and parent review panels endorsed the book, a vocal group of parents condemned the acclaimed work as pornographic.

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